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Saturday, January 09, 2010

No Such Thing as a Sane Truther

Paul Craig Roberts, who once was a respected economist and pundit, is now a full fledged nutter. Not much more to add on him, but one thing that always amuses me on this whole "missiles at the Pentagon" thing is how precise they are. They can't just say something vague like, "it is probable that there are some sort of air defenses", which would be the logical thing to say, since their presence is not backed by any evidence of any sort, but a very precise statement (emphasis added):

If we are to believe the U.S. government,Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged al-Qaida "mastermind" behind 9/11, outwitted the CIA, the NSA, indeed all 16 U.S. intelligence agencies as well as those of all U.S. allies including Mossad, the National Security Council, NORAD, Air Traffic Control, Airport Security four times on one morning, and Dick Cheney, and with untrained and inexperienced pilots pulled off skilled piloting feats of crashing hijacked airliners into the World Trade Center towers, and the Pentagon, wherea battery of state of the art air defenses somehow failed to function.

Just ask Brian Good about the state of the art air defenses which don't shoot down any plane that gets within a kilometer of the Pentagon while landing at National. Of course, those that do don't get shot down either....

Speaking of Petgoat, it does kinda suck that all the comments in the archives are gone, as I occasionally went back to look at his "greatest hits" to get a laugh....

Of the few twoofers who had respectable reputations at one time, PCR has probably fallen the farthest. In his case, his illness was degenerative. He went from being supply-side guru to nativist to da twoof. He's probably made enough money over the years that he won't end up living under a bridge, but at this point his mental state is little different from someone who does.

I can never understand why, after the fact, Truthers are so adamant that civilian planes should have been shot down.

If they had been, which Truther that you have ever heard of would accept the story and how many of them would be screaming, "Murderers!"

Aside from the fact that Truthers have never provided evidence for anti-aircraft missiles it doesn't seem to bother them that a plane did crash on the White House lawn where, if I remember rightly, there ARE missiles (could anyone confirm if those missiles exist).

'Aside from the fact that Truthers have never provided evidence for anti-aircraft missiles it doesn't seem to bother them that a plane did crash on the White House lawn where, if I remember rightly, there ARE missiles (could anyone confirm if those missiles exist).'

There are unconfirmed reports that the US Secret Service has Stingers (or a similar MANPAD). But given their range and size I doubt they'd have been much use against an airliner.

Yes, a small plane DID crash into the White House while Clinton was President (he was not there)on September 12th, 1994 (September again? Conspiracy?). The Secret Service has Stingers, but didn't see the plane until it was too late. According to the NY Times the Secret Service protocals involved getting the President out of thr WH before an attacking plane got there. The Clintons were all at Blair House that day. The plane had been stolen by Frank Eugene Corder, 38, a truck driver from Maryland.

You should read this NY Times article because there is a discussion about how Washington was vulnerable to terror attacks from the skies AND why firing anti-aircraft missiles in DC was problematic.

"Today's experience suggests that if a man with limited flying skill could blunder into a near-hit on the President's bedroom with no resistance, then a determined, skilled and knowledgeable assassin could inflict far greater damage."

Brent Scowcroft:

"It's very hard to defend against, very hard," he said. "Even if you have them on radar and you're worried about them, are you really going to shoot them down?"

And:

"He said it would be particularly difficult to detect the plane if the pilot had turned off the transponder, the instrument that sends a signal that can be detected by radar. Mr. Meyer said he did not know whether the Cessna had a transponder or whether it was off."

A missile fired from the roof of the White House, moreover, could hit other buildings and people in downtown Washington.

Yeah, not to mention that even if it did hit its target, the wreckage of the fucking plane hitting a dorm building at George Washington U. would be a bit problematic, huh?

In the fever dreams of the "truthers" of course, there's no problem with shooting down a 757 over a densely populated area. Yeah, the flaming wreck probably won't slam into the highrise condos in Crystal City after being shot down by the SAM site at the Pentagon.

angrysob, the issue with NORAD is not that they didn't shoot the planes down; it's that they didn't intercept the planes. Intercepting problem planes was a routine procedure. It was done 1500 times in 1990-94.

http://www.fas.org/man/gao/gao9476.htm

It's not surprising that truthers can't provide evidence for SAMs at the Pentagon before 9/11. Military defenses would not be expected to be public information.

NY's remarks about the impossibility of installing SAMs because of the risk of collateral damage would appear to be given the lie by that fact SAMs were installed AFTER 9/11.

New Yorker's already pointed out your silliness in contradicting yourself.

I suppose it's top secret as to whether these post-9/11 missiles can fly back in time.

Btw, that link you provided makes you look a laughing stock. It's dated 1994 and says:

"The continental air defense evolved during the Cold War to detect andintercept Soviet bombers attacking North America via the North Pole.GAO concludes that such an air defense is no longer needed and could bedisbanded at an annual savings of as much as $370 million. "

And it reapeats over an over again its recommendations that the number of fighters on standby be reduced.

And those figures you gave were for fighters that were scrambledand fighters were scrambled on 9/11 completely removing any point that you may have been trying to make by linking to that article.

"Overall, during the past 4 years, NORAD's alertfighters took off to intercept aircraft (referred to as scrambled)1,518 times, or an average of 15 times per site per year. Of theseincidents, the number of suspected drug smuggling aircraft averagedone per site, or less than 7 percent of all of the alert sites' totalactivity.\3 The remaining activity generally involved visuallyinspecting unidentified aircraft and assisting aircraft in distress."

Oh, and the link doesn't explain how long it would take to intercept a plane, particularly not one that had no transponder squawking but I guess that's a minor factor in the Trooferverse.

Paul W characterised the way that Truthers read documents and you've gone and given a textbook example.

NY, maybe you should consider the possibility that the environment was different before 9/11 than it was after 9/11. Before 9/11, the Pentagon defenses were nobody's business. After 9/11, the Pentagon obviously wanted it known that they had SAMS there. They parked Humvee rigs around the building that had SAMs mounted on them. Here's a recent version of the rig:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/SAM-HMMWV.jpg

Of course if you can mount SAMS on a Humvee you can mount them on a building or on the grounds nearby in innocuous-looking equipment sheds, but everybody knows it's just ludicrous to think that a military HQ would think to defend itself, right?

As to Billman's claim that the proximity of civilan aircraft would make self defense impossible, that's pretty simple minded too. Tracking systems know the difference between something coming at the building and something going past the building.

Paulw, you seem to make a habit of dishonest framing. First you try to pretend that there was no option short of shoot-down (when there was a graded range of possible responses) and then you try to pretend that the claim is that no fighters were scrambled (when the issue is that no airliners were intercepted).

Yes it really is as simple as "Hey there's a jet off course. There could be a collision. Get a fighter up there and order him to land."

angrysob, you guys are good at generating arguments that might fool a ten-year-old, but they're pretty silly in grown-up-land.

The issue of how many fighters there were is irrelevant. One C-130H, you may remember, was able to intercept flight 77 and get within 14 miles of flight 93. There were plenty of fighters.

The issue is that intercepting unidentified aircraft was a routine, once-a-day action ten years before 9/11. It's not like NORAD forgot how it was done in six years. It seems you missed the fact that an unidentified aircraft is by definition an aircraft without a transponder.

NY, maybe you should consider the possibility that the environment was different before 9/11 than it was after 9/11.

Sure. So what?

Before 9/11, the Pentagon defenses were nobody's business. After 9/11, the Pentagon obviously wanted it known that they had SAMS there.

Ah yes, after 9/11, the military wanted everyone to know all things that were previously classified.

I've explained to you many times, Petgoat, that your bald assertions do not come anywhere close to what sane people call "evidence".

Of course if you can mount SAMS on a Humvee you can mount them on a building or on the grounds nearby in innocuous-looking equipment sheds, but everybody knows it's just ludicrous to think that a military HQ would think to defend itself, right?

Again, we're just missing that small detail known as "evidence".

Tracking systems know the difference between something coming at the building and something going past the building.

Yes. And you are aware of the fact that National Airport is spitting distance from the Pentagon and thus aircraft approach the Pentagon as they land? Somehow, the Potomac isn't littered with the wreck of thousands of civilian jetliners shot down by the SAMs that supposedly exist at the Pentagon....

Yes it really is as simple as "Hey there's a jet off course. There could be a collision. Get a fighter up there and order him to land."

False.

angrysob, you guys are good at generating arguments that might fool a ten-year-old, but they're pretty silly in grown-up-land.

You mean "ten-year-old girls", don't you, Petgoat?

The issue of how many fighters there were is irrelevant. One C-130H, you may remember, was able to intercept flight 77 and get within 14 miles of flight 93. There were plenty of fighters.

Nobody cares, Petgoat.

The issue is that intercepting unidentified aircraft was a routine, once-a-day action ten years before 9/11. It's not like NORAD forgot how it was done in six years. It seems you missed the fact that an unidentified aircraft is by definition an aircraft without a transponder.

The military wanted people to believe that there were no SAMs at the Pentagon. Thus they very publicly "installed" them.

You're going to eventually present evidence for SAMs at the Pentagon, right Petgoat?

The airliners fly down the Potomac--past the Pentagon. They don't fly toward it at close range.

Another classic Insane Assertion (TM) by Brian Good!

Do you know anything about air defense, Petgoat? Are you aware that any system more powerful than a MANPAD would down every single plane attempting to land at National? Hell, depending on how powerful these SAMs of your glue-bender hallucinations are, they might be downing aircraft at Dulles and Andrews AFB as well.

You guys are seriously out of touch with reality, so all you can wield is lies, straw men, and attitude.

You're in CIT-land. It's not spitting distance, it's 1000 yards away. The airliners fly down the Potomac--past the Pentagon. They don't fly toward it at close range.

And exactly how long does it take a plane flying several hundred miles per hour to travel 1000 yards, versus how long it would take whatever or whoever is controlling your mythological system to make a decision regarding whether the plane is a threat, prepare the secret hidden missiles for launching, and engage the target early enough to prevent it from slamming into the Pentagon anyway.

Paulw, according to the official story there were no attempted interceptions in that all of the scrambled planes took offshore positions and no target coordinates were supplied.

Unidentified aircraft does not refer to drug aircraft (according to your quote) in 93% of the cases.

NY, no I'm not going to present evidence of SAMs at the Pentagon. Why would there be evidence of secret military defense systems?

Your fantasies about downing airliners are feeble, NY.

JamesB, having done a fair amount of debunking myself, I can attest that the hazard is that you put your mind to trying to prove something is impossible rather than trying to discover the truth.

So, let's imagine it's our job to protect the Pentagon from aircraft. Your scenario of an aircraft suddenly turning at 1000 yards against the Pentagon is not very realistic except in the case of a plane taking off from runway 15. That's a short runway, those are regional jets, not international, and the likelihood of an American pilot doing such a thing is not very great. We could guard against it by having weapons already targeted on the narrow set of attack paths. Or it might be better simply to let such an attack go forward. Such decisions are above my pay grade.

A plane coming down the Potomac on the runway 19 flight path would have to turn of the path at least a mile up the river.

There is no reason not to defend against aircraft, such as flight 77, that approach from some flight path other than the DCA paths.

Paulw, you're all attitude, no point. If you write your own material, you'd better quit. If you don't, you need a new writer.

Yes, sir, Major Landis. I know I'm a mere civilian and not just completely unreasonable but even out of line to expect that when the nation is known to be under attack by hijacked airliners, and one of them is reported to be over Baltimore and headed for DC, that fighter jets should scramble to defend DC instead of flying out to defend Cape May. How dare I think such a thing?

How dare I expect that when Abdul Hakim Murad had revealed the Project Bojinka plan to fly a hijacked airliner into the Pentagon in 1995, that the Pentagon ought to have some contingency plans for dealing with such an occurrance. And when a whole crew of Pentagon brass cancelled their flight plans on 9/11 because of security concerns, it's certainly unrealistic of me to expect that the Pentagon might be prepared for an attack. After all, with a measley $500 billion a year budget, we can't expect perfection, can we?

a) The system in place to prevent hijacked planes being flown into buildings should have been better.

Or

b) The fact the system didn't perform better is suspicious.

These are two quite separate concerns but one of those options is the Truther position and the other option is a Truther redoubt where he (or occasionally she) hides out to evade answers before switching back to their previous position.

As to Billman's claim that the proximity of civilan aircraft would make self defense impossible, that's pretty simple minded too. Tracking systems know the difference between something coming at the building and something going past the building.

Yeah, ok. So what happens if someone decides to turn and is now no longer "going past the building" and is now "coming at the building?"

Paulw, according to the official story there were no attempted interceptions in that all of the scrambled planes took offshore positions and no target coordinates were supplied.

Yes. We've been over this many times. What point are you trying to make, Petgoat?

NY, no I'm not going to present evidence of SAMs at the Pentagon. Why would there be evidence of secret military defense systems?

Of course not. There were no SAMs at the Pentagon. At least you've finally admitted as much, Petgoat. Have you finally been taking the medication the nice men in the white coats prescribed for you?

So, let's imagine it's our job to protect the Pentagon from aircraft. Your scenario of an aircraft suddenly turning at 1000 yards against the Pentagon is not very realistic except in the case of a plane taking off from runway 15. That's a short runway, those are regional jets, not international, and the likelihood of an American pilot doing such a thing is not very great. We could guard against it by having weapons already targeted on the narrow set of attack paths. Or it might be better simply to let such an attack go forward. Such decisions are above my pay grade.

A plane coming down the Potomac on the runway 19 flight path would have to turn of the path at least a mile up the river.

There is no reason not to defend against aircraft, such as flight 77, that approach from some flight path other than the DCA paths.

Never mind, you've clearly not been taking any medications, considering the raving gibberish above.

How dare I expect that when Abdul Hakim Murad had revealed the Project Bojinka plan to fly a hijacked airliner into the Pentagon in 1995, that the Pentagon ought to have some contingency plans for dealing with such an occurrance.

Stop lying about Operation Bojinka, Petgoat.

Also, you still haven't told me if you've contacted the Canadian government to warn them of the US invasion? Why not, did Willie Rodriguez tell you not to contact them?

If the Pentagon had a secret defense system how do you know about it. If you know about it then you should be able to site a source. That is how "Truth" works.

A C-130 pulling within 14 miles of flight 77 can hardly be called an intercept. Those intercepts you site that occurred during the Cold War involved our planes drawing within feet of the Soviet BEARs, close enough to photograph the faces of the pilots. Remember when that Chinese Mig flew into the proppeller of one of our P-3s? THAT is an intercept.

From the end of the Cold War to the morning of 9/11/2001, the military had been cut in half. The Air National Guard was under-funded, so they rarely trained to their Cold War standards. Also, most of the jets in the initial scramble on 9/11 weren't even armed with anything more than wax bullets. There was a quote by one of the pilots in Time (?) where one of the F-16 pilots sent to cover Washington was calculating the best way to ram a commercial jetliner and still be able to eject.

Finally,I alway come back to the maintenance guy who was working on one of the antenas on the roof of the Naval Annex. AA77 missed him by less than 12 feet as it snapped off the antena he was working on. The "It was a missle" morons need to talk to that guy.

Billman, I believe a 757 has a turning radius of about a mile. They can't turn like a crop-duster.

NY, yes, I know nobody cares that you lie. They've all come to expect it. In any honest forum, posters would object when someone in their midst lies, but not here. Why is that?

Marc, I didn't say the Pentagon had a secret defense system. I argued that the claim that there was none is unreasonable.

The only reason the C-130 did not intercept flight 93 is because it crashed. The point remains, a C-130 was capable of intercepting two of the 9/11 flights, and 1500 mph F-16s and 1800 mph F-15s did not.

The fact that there were fewer fighters than in the cold war is irrelevant. There were enough to intercept all four planes. The fact that some of the planes may not have been armed is also irrelevant. The point remains that the jetliners were not intercepted.

Billman, I believe a 757 has a turning radius of about a mile. They can't turn like a crop-duster.

Noone should expect them too, I agree. But it doesn't take very long at all for a plane to turn around, regardless of it's turning radius. I've ridden in all manner of jetliners from 727 to 747, and they don't take long to turn 180 degrees...

NY, yes, I know nobody cares that you lie. They've all come to expect it. In any honest forum, posters would object when someone in their midst lies, but not here. Why is that?

I meant that nobody cares that you're a proven liar, Petgoat.

Marc, I didn't say the Pentagon had a secret defense system. I argued that the claim that there was none is unreasonable.

We're just waiting on that little thing called "evidence"....

The only reason the C-130 did not intercept flight 93 is because it crashed. The point remains, a C-130 was capable of intercepting two of the 9/11 flights, and 1500 mph F-16s and 1800 mph F-15s did not.

Please see a psychiatrist, Petgoat.

I'm glad to see that at least you're not denying being Petgoat anymore, Brian. You're making progress towards being an ever-so-slightly less obvious liar.

If you want to see the cockroaches scramble,bring up Bojinka.If anything illustrates the sheer bankruptcy of the Debunker Cult it's this subject.I mean how obvious do the lies have to be before the Cult folds it's hand and moves onto more fertile territory?

If you want to see the cockroaches scramble,bring up Bojinka.If anything illustrates the sheer bankruptcy of the Debunker Cult it's this subject.I mean how obvious do the lies have to be before the Cult folds it's hand and moves onto more fertile territory?

I suppose if it's "obvious", then you'll be bringing this evidence into court soon, huh?

Funny how you never answer the question as to why you haven't done so.....

Brian Good is merely a punching bag for goofs like you.Your comment is characterized by the usual skedaddle AWAY from the point.And the key question,which was:what was the strategy to deal with the threat of airliners exploding and being aimed at landmark structures on the East Coast? Are you seriously saying that they stood around and did nothing? Jesus,Big Guy,you gotta do better than this!!

"Anyway, given that you've latched onto this whole Bojinka thing, does this mean that you no longer believe MIHOP and thus will stop your illiterate babblings about Barry Jennings and dust?"

No - it just means it found something else to rip on the government about. You see, this poor creature had something happen in its past that has caused it to hate this country. It hates it enough to whine and bitch on the internet but not enough to do anything real about it.

If it wasn't this it would be something else like too few parking spots at its corner bar or its drive through orders always getting fucked up.

Based on its past posting this creature is retired - probably from some barely above minimum wage job it worked at for decades. Its living on social security and eating cat food and blames its pathetic life on the evil government (and most likely the Joos).

Nope, this turd will always have something to whine about either here or some other message board. If it weren't for the interent at his local public library (ironic - isn't it!?) this jackass would be the crazy dirtbag yelling a bunch of insane drivel at NY intersection.

"More dumb and utter claptrap from NY'er.So what about Bojinka? You guys act like it was never revealed publicly and voluminously.Are you saying that no strategy was devised to deal with this threat?"

Why on Earth do Truthers think that a plan by jihadists to hijack planes and fly them into buildings proves it was an inside job?

I mean, I know we're supposed to think about the victims and all that, but I wanna say a few words for the hijackers.

Can't Truthers give these poor boys a bit of credit?

What's so difficult to understand about the fact that a group of guys hijacked planes and flew them into buildings?

Most of you Truthers were probably cheering them on when you saw it happen so why all of a sudden do you pretend you're just asking questions patriots?

Next you'll be saying that it hurts the "official story" that every intelligence agency in the World was telling Condi Rice that al Qaeda was planning an attack and Condi Rice said she hadn't been informed. Or some such crap.

How does Bin Laden's Philippines Al Qaeda operation support the Troofer theories? It just means that Al Qaeda and bin Laden had a history of trying to blow up jets while they were in the air.

Different region and different tactic. Just more evidence that Al Qaeda was getting familiar with commercial jetlines.

Even though there were enough fighters to intercept the four aircraft on 9/11/2001, they were late in getting up (in the case of New York) and were looking for over-the-horizon threats. They had no vector for a target. They had all switched off their IFF signals,and the military couldn't track them because they were late to the game. My brother flew in AWACs, he said that tracking a target is easy once it is identified, but if you cannot isolate the target from the 100s of other aircraft in the area you're screwed. On the opening night of Desert Storm his plane was targeted by one of our own F-15s because it had been vectored in by a sloppy AWACs crew. They were able to contact the pilot and wave him off.

Fighter intercept is not as easy as troofers seem to think that it is.

Angrysob, Brian, see a psychiatrist… Angrysob, Brian, see a psychiatrist… Billman, Brian, see a psychiatrist… NY, Brian, see a psychiatrist… Billman, Brian, see a psychiatrist… NY, Brian, see a psychiatrist… Marc, Brian, see a psychiatrist… James, Brian, see a psychiatrist… Pat, Brian, see a psychiatrist…

But I thought the Pentagon had a state of the art super mostest advanced defense ever built.... you're telling me your imaginary system can't shoot a plane down in 30 seconds? Then what the fuck is it good for?

CIWS can do it instantly, and that's old technology we have on our NAVY ships... and it'll take down a jetliner.

You know where I'm having lunch today? The Oyster Bar!!! While a guy like Shyte is eating his meals at Taco Bell and Troy is working on a rabbit,I'll be feasting at the World's Greatest restaurant!!!!!!

You couldn't reason your way out of a wet paper bag. But "nobody cares" including you.

True! Nobody cares about the opinions of a hopeless lunatic who posts here because it feeds his mental illnesses. You're completely irrelevant, Brian. I'm only here to laugh at you, but my conscience tells me to suggest that you seek professional help for your mental illnesses.

'I know I'm a mere civilian and not just completely unreasonable but even out of line to expect that when the nation is known to be under attack by hijacked airliners, and one of them is reported to be over Baltimore and headed for DC, that fighter jets should scramble to defend DC instead of flying out to defend Cape May.'

Three basic facts, Mongchild:

(1) Due to the budget cuts in NORAD from the end of the Cold War to 2001, only 4 Air National Guard planes were on stand-by to cover the Eastern seaboard of the USA.

(2) The 'exercises' run by NORAD NEADS on 11th September 2001 were all CPEXes, so no real planes were in flight until the first hijackings were recorded.

(3) NORAD (and this is something you truther cunts keep forgetting) is a bi-national command. So were the Canucks in on this 'inside job' or what?